


Star Wars Fictober Challenge - completed

by Arkhia



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Depa lives, Droid POV, Ficlet Collection, Gen, I tried to keep the tagging on a minimum, Implied Relationships, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Luminara lives, and, and the relationships are either very significant or appear in more than one ficlet, because i really love that one, the tagged characters all have a POV, the two longest ones are
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 16:59:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12586496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arkhia/pseuds/Arkhia
Summary: A collection of the ficlets I wrote for the challenge, all 30+1 of them, organized chronologically. If you want to read them in the order I wrote them you can find it on my tumblr romanaisalive under the tag 'starwarsfictober'.Chapter 1 - Luminara lives AU - Luminara and the Ghost crew, Kanera implied, Ahsoka makes an appearance, 6 daysChapter 2 - Depa lives AU - Depa, Caleb/Kanan, Jocasta Nu, 7 daysChapter 3 - Shaak Ti (2 days), skiing AU (modern AU, Luminara, Barriss, Ahsoka, Mace, Blyla, 3 days), Mr. Quiffy (Mace, Qui-Gon, padawan Depa, 2 days)Chapter 4 - Unnamed Inquisitor (2 days), 8 unconnected stories: Bail, Dex, Galen Erso, Skywalker twins (Leia POV), Kanan, Barriss (time travel AU), Unnamed Padawan in RotS, Aayla's R4 unit, + ending (breaking the fourth wall, everyone)





	1. Luminara lives

**Bond  
day 10 - prompt: dream**

_It felt like falling._

_Barriss stumbled a few steps ahead, barely feeling her limbs as the snowstorm surrounded her. Thanks to her medical training she was painfully aware what every sign her body gave meant, and she catalogued them, critically listening to her own heartbeat. She lost almost all of her fingers by now, her clothing was next to useless, the cold cutting through where the creature from yesterday tore the fabric apart. She stopped shivering a few minutes ago, and had to force her legs to move at all. She saw countless people pushing through the pain even after all hope was lost and duly noted it as an example for survival instinct, just never thought it would apply to herself one day._

_One more step, then another. The snow seemed to grow deeper as she made progress. She lifted her leg but lost her balance and fell over. The survivalist whispered in her mind to get up, but it felt far away by now._

_She felt as the snow buried her, falling from the cliff she tried to get to._

_Then she didn’t feel anything at all._

Luminara woke with a gasp, scrambling for something that wasn’t there. Her hand found the edge of the bed, she held onto it. Her heart rate slowly returned back to normal and she realized she was shivering.

Outside her cell the next shift of guards arrived.

 

**Rescued  
day 25 - prompt: heartbeat**

Someone was calling her name. The sound barely registered in her mind, feeling more like a dream than anything else. Her sense of reality was lost some time ago, she floated on the edge on consciousness since then. She didn’t know how much time passed, it could have been months or years or just a few hours, but she knew that nobody called her by her name anymore. This was… unusual.

The gentle touch on her back was even more unusual. She could barely recall the last time she was touched, and it was anything but friendly. This woke her up a bit more, but not enough to react, not even in the safety of her mind. Touch meant danger, one way or the other, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

She felt as the person beside her moved closer and easily picked her up, felt a low rumble against her head - they were talking again, but she couldn’t differentiate the words. Then suddenly they were moving, her head resting against their shoulder, faster and faster. She instinctively curled her fingers into the material of their clothes, trying to avoid the pain of falling, not knowing why she bothered. She heard the sound blasters made, a humming of a lightsaber, and her breath hitched.

She was handed to someone else, this time someone big and distinctively furry. A Wookie? Kashyyk?

The sounds of the battle slowly ceased, and she found herself desperately wishing them back. It was proof of something she considered important once, something she couldn’t concentrate enough to recall now. She needed the noise.

She couldn’t do anything about that, though, so she searched for the closest thing to listen to. When she tried it was surprisingly easy to find.

_Thump. Thump. Thump._

The heartbeat of whoever was holding her now echoed loudly in her ears.

She focused on it.

 

**Of Jedi and Crew  
day 3 - prompt: emotion**

Hera prided herself on having a clear head when others let their feelings cloud their judgement. She liked to think she knew what she was doing, and even if she let the circumstances rule over her at times, she always climbed out just fine. Kanan may have been a Jedi, but she thought - no, she knew - that she did a way better job of keeping her feelings at bay.

Now, though… now she didn’t know what to feel.

Kanan was hers. Ezra was hers. Even Ahsoka was hers, in a way. She had her hands full of her disasters of Jedi, she didn’t need to adopt more and their mess.

She didn’t need to, but with every second she was more convinced that she would.

It was not fair, really. Maybe they all forgot that the once-untouchable Jedi proved to be very, very touchable - Kanan definitely did in this case - or what an Imperial prison could do to a person, but neither of them anticipated this.

She silently watched Luminara staring at the door like she expected someone to come in and hurt her at any time and she had to swallow. She had no idea how this would work, she knew there must have been someone out there more suited for the job, but the protective streak in her chest was the same when she took Kanan, Zeb, Sabine, Ezra with her, when she found Chopper…

She could tell the others whatever she wanted but in her heart Hera already knew that the Ghost has gained another broken crew member.

 

**Destiny Has a Name  
day 12 - prompt: destiny**

Kanan didn’t believe in destiny.

He may have, once upon a time. He still remembered the talk about his Grandmaster’s abilities, about shatterpoints, about roads not taken. It wasn’t exactly destiny, but something like that.

He didn’t believe anymore. His Master’s death couldn’t have been destiny - he refused to accept it, denied even the possibility that it was part of some twisted path he had to walk.

He continued to deny it even after he met Hera. She seemed to believe in some bigger purpose, and while they never named it it was still a little too close for comfort. He had been a part of something bigger and it didn’t work out.

When Ezra first came aboard the Ghost and the Force pushed at him like it hasn’t done in a long time he refused again. After a few missions, after they started working together and he accepted his role as the boy’s Master (not because destiny, because he wanted to) he found the humor in that his supposedly-destined padawan shared his point of view on the topic.

When Hera announced that Luminara will be staying with them for an unspecified amount of time he knew it wasn’t destiny.

Except if it was named Hera Syndulla.

 

**Mirror  
day 6 - prompt: friend**

Space was cold. Luminara tried to curl up more in her chair in the corner of the Ghost’s lounge, looking on as the others milled about. Hera convinced her to come out and spend some time in the same room as the crew, and so far she didn’t regret it. They were all careful around her, mindful of her personal space and avoided any sudden movement. An almost-forgotten streak of pride protested inside her mind, but she could acknowledge that she needed their thoughtfulness.

A quiet cough from the door averted her attention. Ahsoka stood there with a blanket in her hand which she questioningly lifted in a clear offering, and when she nodded she extended it to her, waiting until she grabbed it. The method had been in practice since she freaked out over Ezra handing her a spoon, and so far proved to be successful. (She wasn’t looking forward the time she needed to confront this particular problem.)

She gratefully wrapped the blanket around herself and looked around once more. Hera and Kanan were in the opposite corner of the room discussing something over what looked like flight patterns, Ezra and Zeb were teasing Chopper (she knew how that one was going to end) and Sabine took hold of the bigger part of the table, painting something. It was domestic, it was nice, it was… weirdly normal. She watched Ahsoka making her way to Kanan and Hera and leaned her head on the back of the chair. Maybe she should try to sleep like this - it seemed easier than at night, alone in her bed, even if she knew Ahsoka was there, only separated by a folding screen.

She almost drifted off when Sabine straightened up, stretching her arms and smiled at her, lifting the completed picture from the table and holding it in her direction.

“Do you like it?”

She squinted at the painting. It was a portrait of her - thin, battered, her skin marred by scars, but it had something she never saw in mirrors anymore.

“So?”, tilted her head Sabine.

“Yes”, she said quickly, clearing her throat. “Yes, thank you.”

“You can have it.”

She took it, and as she stared at the image she found herself blinking back tears. If the girl who didn’t know her before, likely wasn’t even born back then saw something in her… Then maybe, just maybe she wasn’t a lost cause after all.

 

**Stopover  
day 30 - prompt: peace**

Yavin IV was a remote world. Kanan couldn’t see the greenery Sabine enthusiastically described, but the moon was full of life, the air smelled fresh and the ground felt untouched under his feet. Ezra did his best to explain the huge buildings they found and the feeling they woke in everyone but he didn’t need to see them to understand. There was something in the atmosphere which spoke to him, even if he couldn’t appreciate certain aspects of the place.

Stargazing, for example, didn’t make a lot of sense. Or it wouldn’t have without the others, but as it was when it came up he was as happy about it as the rest of the crew, albeit for different reasons. Stargazing, when all of them participated, was similar to a meditation session. The peacefulness in the others swept into his bones, silencing his worries for the time.

They took the Ghost out to a small clearing after successfully dragging Hera away from her work. At first they just sat down in the grass, talking quietly about anything and everything, then one by one laid down to stare at the sky (or, in his case, not stare). Hera used him as a personal pillow, one lek laying on his chest while he absentmindedly stroked the other. He listened to the sounds of nature surrounding them and the occasional murmuring voices. Hera kept silent, and if he didn’t know precisely how she sounded like when she was sleeping he would’ve thought she dozed off.

Sabine and Ezra were the loudest. He reached out with the Force to check on them - they were laying at the centre of the clearing with Luminara between them, and the three of them were lazily discussing saber techniques. Rocky start or not, he was grateful she was with them, helping out when his own teaching wasn’t enough.

Ahsoka felt like a statue, but Zeb was shifting around more than all of them, cursing the local plants sticking to his fur. It took a while, but in the end he seemed to find a comfortable position, and stretched out.

He was really thankful that they decided to leave Chopper to get a full maintenance check that day.


	2. Family - Depa lives

**Beginning of an Era  
day 1 - prompt: first**

In the first heartbeat she didn't understand it. The Force was shouting at her, but no, it wasn't the Force - maybe her training bond wasn’t as strong as it had been in her padawan years, but still present enough to carry the message.

_Run._

She didn’t get it, then the last remains of a presence shattered, leaving a hole in reality, and she felt herself moving. She grabbed her padawan, ignoring his confused yelp, only passing on the received feeling onto their training bond as an explanation. The kid trusted her, so when their troopers started shooting they had a head start. The Force hurt, but it still guided her to a nearby fighter, and she didn’t waste the time. The planet shrank behind them as she drove their fighter for the stars. She could feel the boy clinging to her, could feel thousands crying out, could feel what was like the universe blinking out of existence.

She knew they couldn’t go home.

She knew her Master was dead.

Depa Billaba held her padawan’s hand and ran.

 

**The Comforts of Nature  
day 5 - prompt: game**

The ferret-like creatures came with the sunset every day. They left her belongings alone, focusing on the mice that scurried around the place, trying to get the crumbs of her evening meal. She watched them hunt: one head served as lookout while the other caught their prey, then they swapped. The parents always kept one set of eyes on their young as the little ones ran up and down, their heads still uncoordinated. They took a liking to her cooking equipment, jumping over and rolling when they missed the landing.

They were adorable in their weird way.

Jocasta liked their presence in the Force - it was nothing like the Temple, but their buzzing energy filled some of the void. They liked her as well, she could connect with them easily. Sometimes she let the smaller ones climb all the way to her shoulder, small claws clinging to her robe, but she preferred when one of the adult creatures laid on her knee, expecting to be petted. The warmth their small bodies produced wasn’t enough against the chill of the autumn, but it felt good.

She hoped this species didn’t spend the winter in hibernation.

 

**Son  
day 11 - prompt: child**

Depa put her hand on Caleb’s shoulder. She felt him almost vibrating with impatience, and sent a sense of calm through their bond, careful to not jostle the Force around them. They needed to stay hidden, both from searching eyes and searching Force-sensitive imperials.

Her hair tickled her neck as the wind picked up - she chopped it short along with Caleb’s padawan braid. She hoped they could reach a planet where they wouldn’t have to hide on plain sight, maybe one with small population so they could disappear into the unknown, but until then the facade was everything. They had different names, different stories, and maybe she didn’t have to wear her hair short but Kanan Jarrus had no business having a braid.

She taught Caleb on the fly about Force-shielding, and she really, really wanted to believe it would be enough. Her first instinct would have been searching for other survivors, maybe find out just what happened on Coruscant, but now she had Caleb, and his safety overruled everything.

The crowd started to move towards the open doors of the vessel and they went with the flow. Caleb’s hand slipped into her own, something they rarely did before but became a habit nowadays.

It was nice to know her kid walked secure by her side.

 

**Winter  
day 7 - prompt: absent**

Winter was bleak on this planet. Jocasta had to move to a small settlement as the cold made her living space unfit for the time being, but even the people there didn’t seem to have any vitality. They went about their daily business, and didn’t bat an eye at the stranger, maybe because they didn’t know each other either. She chose this place for this exact reason, but after a few weeks of blank stares she started to regret it. At least the little two-headed creatures played with the others and wanted to be petted, which was more interaction she had amongst the locals.

She tried to visit their preferred places once or twice, but it soon became evident that they either migrated in the winter or more likely spent it in hibernation. It felt like the whole planet followed their example. She could meditate for hours uninterrupted, the small shop she found work in didn’t attract lot of customers. Even the Force felt muted somehow.

After two months in this state she would’ve accepted just about anything non-life-threatening event to break the silence, and it came in an unusual way.

She was walking to her house from work, contemplating if she should copy the few datapads she brought with her again, just in case, when a shuttle zipped over the houses and landed on the station the village seemed to keep only for the weekly supply deliveries. She quickened her pace, and arrived just in time to see the newcomers paying for their transportation and the shuttle taking off again. The Force sang and she couldn’t help but smile.

It had been a long time since she saw an other Jedi.

 

**Reunion  
day 13 - prompt: look**

Catching a ride to a hopelessly dull place was exactly as hard as it sounded. Caleb (Kanan, Kanan now, he had to remember) tried to help his Master as best he could, but as an ordinary kid he didn’t have many chances. Nobody wanted to go to the middle of nowhere for a fair price, and even with the support Cham Syndulla provided they were short on credits.

Master Depa (he needed to remember her name too, Danja Uvain currently, even if he took to call her Mom nowadays - less confusion, fewer possibilities to get it wrong) finally found a barely functioning cargo ship with a pilot bored enough to take them to the settlement. The journey was uneventful - it was winter on this part of the planet, and not the fun kind. The only snow he saw was on the top of the mountains they flew over to reach a huge plain, fly over that as well and land on the other side. The village was nestled in the side of the mountains at the other end of the plain, and seemed reasonably cozy from a distance.

From up close it just looked lifeless.

He turned around while his Master paid for their lift. Houses, empty marketplace, houses, street, a small park, houses, Madame Nu from the Archives, houses… Wait, what?

The ship took off behind them and he touched Master Depa’s arm, who was trying to tie together most of their luggage to make it easier to carry.

“Mom…”

She looked at him, but continued her task.

“Yes?”

He took her arm and tugged on it.

“Look.”

“What are you… _oh._ ”

He was reasonably sure he hasn’t seen this kind of smile on her face since Commander Grey tried to kill them.

“Very well,” she murmured, and ruffled his hair. “Let’s take these and go, hmm?”

He quickly obliged, and they followed Madame Nu, who wordlessly lifted one of their bags off of Caleb’s shoulder, smiling exactly like his Master.

 

**Legacy  
day 19 - prompt: order**

“This is all that’s left,” gestured Madame Nu at the stack of datapads and holocrons. Depa nodded, and wordlessly handed her the holocron she took with her on their last mission. Madame Nu held it up for a second, then handed it back to her.

“Keep it. You’re using it with Caleb anyway.”

Depa put the small cube away, and glanced at the back of the room where Caleb slept on a hastily put together bed, exhausted from the day’s excitement, then back at the stack of information before her. She remembered the endless space of the Archives, afternoons spent with Master Tahl when she was little, fascinated by all of it. She always thought Madame Nu was the boring one, even when she was old enough to know better, but the times have changed. Master Tahl was long gone, along with the Archives now, she was a Master herself and Madame Nu was everything but boring if she managed to escape the purge. She really needed to reevaluate her childhood beliefs once more.

She did that a lot lately. 

A tap on her shoulder brought her back to the present, and she looked up to see her companion’s wry smile.

“Go lie down. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

If she was a little less tired she would have protested but as it was she obeyed without a second thought. The couch was more comfortable than a lot of the places they slept in the past year with Caleb, and she had no trouble closing her eyes.

Already half-asleep she felt someone covering her with a blanket, and she relaxed in a way she never allowed herself since they flew from Kaller. They were as safe as they could be, and she wasn’t the only one calling the shots anymore.

It was a comforting thought.

 

**Legacy II  
day 21 - prompt: family**

Depa slowly woke up. The sun draw patterns on her eyelids, as she blinked it blinded her. She turned away from the sun and sat up, squinting at the empty room. She heard movement from the kitchen, but before she could get up Caleb appeared in the doorway, and launched himself at her.

“Morning,” she chuckled, looking down at him. “What are you doing over there?”

“Madame Nu let me help with breakfast,” he said, beaming up at her. “And she answers all my questions like you!”, he added in a conspiratory whisper.

Depa smiled and squeezed him closer. She wasn’t surprised - now that she had some time to think about it, the worst fate for a librarian must have been the complete disinterest surrounding her about everything she knew. No wonder Jocasta Nu answered all of Caleb’s questions now that finally someone asked for information at all.

“It’s almost ready,” said Caleb after a long minute of silent cuddling. “We should go and eat before it goes cold.”

Depa laughed.

“And you are right once more, my padawan.”

She let Caleb lead her, only stopping to close the door behind her. As she looked back for a moment she thought she saw a figure standing in the sunlight, looking at her with a familiar posture. She blinked, and pulled the door shut, but as she stepped into kitchen she could swear she felt an approving hand on her shoulder, accompanied by the distinctive presence of her Master.

But maybe it was just her imagination.


	3. Shaak Ti, Skiing AU and Mr. Quiffy

####  **Shaak Ti**

**Adopting Clones and Arguing with Scientists  
day 2 - prompt: island**

The ocean seems endless on Kamino. All sentient life comes from the platforms, and although Shaak Ti has her doubts about a culture developing this way it’s not the weirdest thing she’s ever seen. What really bothers her is the kaminoans themselves and their conviction that they have every right to farm people, each a different world in the Force, like they would farm plants in any other environment. She’s here for a reason - they need the clones, it doesn’t matter what the Order thinks about it, but they can make it better. Perhaps.

A week into her stay and she’s not sure about it. Encouraging individuality is one thing, but when met with genetic alteration and a desperately stubborn bunch of scientists it proves to be a challenge. Well, never let it be said she didn’t do her part. She launches herself into the project, and while she’s not smug, per se (Jedi don’t do smug), she’s not exactly sorry to see Taun We grimacing when her newest interventions work out perfectly.

One year later she finds herself denying a little too fervently that she adopted a whole army of men.

Not that Plo can say one word on the topic, himself.

 

**One of Their Own  
day 22 - prompt: pain**

The first thing she registered when she woke up was pain. Her montrals ached, her left lek felt like it was on fire, and cold metal was digging uncomfortably into her side. She tried to move her fingers, but even the tiniest movement sent white-hot needles into her whole body.

The second was the noise around her. Kamino was always full of subtle sounds, the children moving on the hallways, the buzzing of the ever-present machines, but nothing like this. The constant hammering hurt her head, and she spent quite a few minutes listening and adapting when she realized it was just a spacecraft’s engine, made loud by her discomfort. She did her best to filter it out, and when she somehow succeeded she realized that the only other sound was her own ragged breath.

She tried to reach out with the Force, but the backlash she received knocked the air out of her lungs. She tried to get her breathing under control, but she was a beat too late to avoid the coughing fit overwhelming her. Someone put an arm under her back lek, pulling her up until she could breathe freely. She tried to get a look at her companion, and while her vision was too hazy to be of any use, the person’s next words betrayed them.

“Take it easy, General,” murmured the clone trooper still supporting her back. She knew she knew his name, but right now she had trouble recalling her own. “Take it easy,” he repeated, and she felt a water bottle touching her lips. She drank a few sips before it was taken away, already feeling a bit better. She tried to say something - ask a question, express her gratitude, she wasn’t sure herself -, but no sound came out.

“Shh,” soothed her the trooper, obviously distracted by something. “It’s okay.”

She felt the injection at the base of her skull, and relaxed almost immediately.

“Sleep, General,” she heard in her half-conscious state.

She slept.

 

####  **Skiing AU**

**Safe  
day 29 - prompt: promise**

_I’ll be there at dinner._

He didn’t even think when he said it, part of an everyday conversation with his daughter. He got out of work at 6 pm, 6:30 at worst, the journey to Depa’s flat was about thirty minutes long, they were used to having dinner around 7 pm. Simple calculations.

When he saw the melting snow at noon he inwardly cursed, but didn’t think of it much. Of course every road would be frozen by the time he had to drive on them, but that was just his luck. He sent a message to Depa around 5 pm saying that he will be a little late, and the received response wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. Certainly not something that should’ve haunted him later.

_Sure thing. Be safe._

He left work at 6 pm, not wanting to be much late. The streets were mostly abandoned, nobody wanted to drive before street maintenance could take care of the ice, which suited him just fine. Fewer drivers, less chance of an accident.

He was two blocks from his destination when a black minivan coming from a side street spun out of control in the turn of the road. He tried to get out of the way, but his wheels slipped as well, and the minivan slammed into the side of his car, taking both vehicles into the ditch running alongside the road. The last thing he saw was black metal burying him before he lost consciousness.

When he woke up a week later in the hospital Depa’s tears hurt a hundred times more than the pain in his amputated right arm.

 

**Mother  
day 17 - prompt: confess**

Nineteen years of teaching, fourteen years of being a mother, and Luminara could swear she hasn’t been this scared before. Barriss was a good kid, a bit too good at times, not too accident-prone, and when she did manage to get herself into dangerous situations she’s been there to check her over. Until now, that is.

She was at the ski slope with the rest of the students when Barriss and Ahsoka decided to go on a little expedition on their own around the resort. All would have been well if not for an incident involving ice under the snow and a sprained ankle, which paired with the approaching snowstorm made a dangerous combination. The girls were safely back in the house now, thanks to Yoda, the old man who lived just next to the lodge, Ahsoka being fussed over by her brother Rex and angrily mumbling at her, a bit high on painkillers.

Her frantic searching must have became obvious because after a few seconds she was pushed in the right direction by an irritated-looking (as was the normal for him) Mace Windu, whose missing arm may have stopped him from skiing with his adult daughter, but not from appearing the most unexpected times to give well-sorted hard truths to his current victim.

“That way,” he grumbled now. “And good grief, show that girl some love.”

Which brought her back to the very same topic Ahsoka was muttering about.

It wasn’t like she didn’t love Barriss, she did. She’s raised her for fourteen years after adopting her when she was two, and loved her fiercely. She was just…

Well. Contrary to what most of the school thought Luminara Unduli had emotions, she just wasn’t sure what to do with them.

Barriss sat just outside the small emergency room, wrapped in a blanket, tea in hand. She looked up at her arrival, with all the awkwardness of a miserable sixteen-year-old who was unsure what to expect. _What a pair we make._

“Mother,” she nodded.

“Are you okay?”

A nod again. Luminara hesitated, then sat down next to her. _Show that girl some love._ She opened her mouth then closed it. Barriss was still looking at her with wide eyes. She slowly raised her hand to touch her arm, and when she didn’t get any protests she pulled the girl into a side hug. Barriss stilled, and she almost let her go but after the first moment she completely relaxed into the embrace.

“I was worried,” she whispered, finding her voice. It wasn’t I love you, but it was progress, and she hoped the girl understood.

“Sorry, Mom.” Barriss’ voice was almost inaudible as she hid her face in her shoulder.

She hasn’t heard her saying Mom for more than a year.

 

**Morning Snow  
day 20 - prompt: happy**

Aayla ran along the trees, stumbling on the rocks under the snow until she reached the edge of the forest. She crouched down, gathered a handful of snow and formed it into a ball, then hid behind the nearest bush, waiting for her chance. She couldn’t see Bly from where she was, but his steps made enough noise so she just had to listen. When the moment came she jumped out of her hiding place and threw the snowball at him, hitting him square in the chest. She let out a celebratory shout, only a second before she realized she forgot to duck again, and her blue hair suddenly was full of snow. She yelped and launched herself at him, ungracefully falling into the snow as he moved out of the way.

“Not fair,” she complained, breathless.

“Sorry,” grinned Bly, and offered a hand to help her up. She accepted it, then with the same motion tackled him to the ground. He pulled her with him, and soon they were both laying in the snow, laughing at each other.

“Come on, we’ll miss breakfast,” said Bly, planting a quick kiss on her lips. Aayla hummed in agreement, and they walked back to the lodge, hand in hand. At the entrance Bly yanked at her hand, and she looked up at him questioningly.

“You didn’t plan to turn the whole hall into a swimming pool, right?”

She chuckled and shook her head playfully.

“Wouldn’t dream of it. Care to help with that?”

Bly snorted but brushed the snow off her back, letting her do the same for him. Her hair sticked to her face, both of their caps were soaking wet as the snow melted into them - they looked an absolute mess as they made their way through the hallway but neither of them particularly cared. They’ve never really did, and their honeymoon wasn’t the time they were going to start, after all.

 

####  **Mr. Quiffy**

**Kittens  
day 23 - prompt: dance**

Mace heard the laughter from the other end of the corridor. It wasn’t a rare occurrence, Depa was a mischievous little padawan with a lot of friends, but the loud meowing was unexpected. He carefully opened their door, and had to do a double take at the sight before him.

He heard about the loth-kitten Qui-Gon brought back the other day (he stopped questioning whatever Qui-Gon decided to bring back to the temple some time ago), he just never thought he would meet it in his own quarters. Here it was, anyway, purring loudly as it tried to catch the end of Depa’s padawan robes. Depa, for her part, seemed to move somewhere between dancing and jumping around, spinning out of the reach of the kitten’s claws just in time.

“Now, what do we have here?”, he said loudly after spending enough time admiring the view.

“Master!”, laughed Depa, stopping mid-spin. The kitten tried to use the opportunity, but she was faster, and grabbed it by its scruff. “We were playing with Mr. Quiffy.”

“Mr. Quiffy?”, he repeated, a little confused. Depa’s train of thought was sometimes a mystery on its own.

“He’s fluffy and he was brought here by Master Qui-Gon,” she answered in a “duh” tone. Mace nodded.

“Of course.”

He couldn’t wait to see Qui-Gon’s face when he was informed of the name.

 

**Naming Conventions  
day 24 - prompt: forgiven**

Mace stared at Mr. Quiffy. Mr. Quiffy stared at Mace. Neither of them moved.

The remains of a robe laid between them, part of it still caught in the kitten’s claws. In retrospect he should have known better, leaving out his clean laundry with a cat in the room was a recipe for disaster, but… well, Mace never really had pets. (Except that small lizard he smuggled in once in his padawan years to annoy Master Yoda, but they weren’t even thinking about that anymore.) The only reason the kitten now resided in his quarters was a padawan with too effective puppy eyes and a Knight who couldn’t keep his hoarding tendencies at bay.

“What am I going to do with you?”, he asked the kitten. Mr. Quiffy just blinked back with eyes all too similar to Depa’s and a feigned innocence all too similar to Qui-Gon’s.

Mr. Quiffy shared some worrying traits with his retriever.

And come to think of it… he had in mind just the favour the kitten could make up with for the robe.

“Come on,” he said decidedly, and lifted the loth-cat by his scruff. “Time to discuss your name.”

He found Qui-Gon in a conversation with Quinlan (and oh Force he had a bad feeling about this), and unceremoniously put the kitten down beside him.

“Thought you’d want to know that your namesake has been adopted by Depa,” he said with a completely straight face. Qui-Gon looked at the kitten, furrowing his brow.

“Namesake?”

“Meet Mr. Quiffy,” he deadpanned, and waited for the effect.

Qui-Gon seemed lost for a moment, then realization striked and he groaned.

“Who came up with…”, he started, then stopped abruptly. “ _Tahl._ ”

Mace was reasonably sure when he last saw Qui-Gon Jinn moving this quickly he was accompanied by at least a crew of pirates. He sat down in his place, satisfied, and lifted Mr. Quiffy into his lap, ignoring Quinlan’s disbelieving look.

He considered forgiving the next shredded robe in advance only for Qui-Gon’s expression.


	4. Unconnected

####  **Unnamed Inquisitor**

****

**Missing Piece  
day 18 - prompt: weapon**

_This weapon is your life._

It was a long time ago, between classes and missions and Master and the Archives. The first lesson, the one every initiate learnt.

_This weapon is your life._

The first one, the one with the colour of green, was gone. The red one wasn’t better - it was just a reminder of a Fall that shouldn’t have happened.

_This weapon is your life._

If there was no weapon, no Order, no life anymore then what?

_This weapon is your life._

The Empire snuffed out every light in the Galaxy.

 

**Mercy Kill  
day 16 - prompt: duel**

They’re locked into a dance, sabers spinning closer and closer, never enough, always dangerous. It’s a last stand, as much figuratively as literally. They have nowhere to run to, and they’ll both be dead before sunrise. The fight is unnecessary, an escaped Jedi and a traitor Inquisitor keeping a facade of their lives when they both know how this ends, with fire and no second thought from the Empire as it mows them down. The fight doesn’t matter. They don’t even want to kill each other.

Except it matters. It matters too much to stop, to think. They don’t want to think.

It’s a choice between impersonal fire from ships controlled by strangers, by droids, by enemies or a saber of a friend of a friend. There’s no question in which they would prefer.

A ghost lingers around them, invisible and painful. One of them killed it, the other buried it.

Saber meets saber, the light is blinding for a moment. Pain against pain, style against style, they fight for an order they believed in, a family they lost, broken vows and broken souls. Their last dance is one of defiance against the chaos, born from a wish to do something right.

Engines sounds from the distance, and the older of the two figures moves in, faster, preciser than before, striking with the speed of light.

The fires burn a dead and a live body.

 

####  **Unconnected Ficlets**

**Witness  
day 4 - prompt: flight**

One’s flying ability depends on training, accessible technology and talent. Bail was never really interested in the art of piloting - he knew his way around it, sure, but only in a casual way. He always admired great pilots, and when he had the opportunity to work with Jedi he found their Force-guided instincts incredible.

It was well over ten years ago, of course. The only Force-sensitive around him nowadays is Ahsoka, and they mostly meet over holos. The Rebellion - or what he hopes will one day become a real rebellion, because for now it’s not more harmful than a furious kitten - has old Jedi starfighters and they use it well enough, but Bail can see the difference. The Force is an advantage nobody can quite replace, even if he really wishes now, in the middle of a skirmish - not enough to call it a battle but dangerous in its own right.

There is a reason his heart skips a beat when he sees two starfighters emerging from hyperspace, taking close to impossible turns and clearing out all enemies in record time.

 

**Leftovers  
day 8 - prompt: winter**

Coruscant didn’t have real seasons, but for Dex it often seemed like winter, or what winter was supposed to be. He closed the diner for the day, and began the two-blocks walk to his room when something caught his eye. The object wasn’t any different from scrap metal to an inexperienced observer, but he kept various friendships and one didn’t hold a successful business on the planet without some skills, anyway.

He dragged the object from the rubble it fall in and turned it over, only to push it back under the rubble immediately, casting a quick look to see if anyone payed him any attention. He may have known a bit more about the recent events than the regular citizen, but anyone with half a mind could work out that holding a lightsaber wasn’t a life insurance these days. He liked Obi-Wan well enough and he didn’t have any beef with the others either, but he wasn’t about to get himself killed over a relic, not when the new Empire already threatened anyone non-human.

He continued his walk, sparing a futile glance to the sky. It didn’t snow on Coruscant anything else than the occasional ice, but he half-hoped it would now.

Snow was the only thing the unknown Jedi would get as a grave for their lightsaber - and if he wasn’t mistaken, the only grave they would get themselves.

 

**From the Inside  
day 9 - prompt: flaw**

Huge projects always had a weakness: their own size. Too many people working, too many potential domino effects in place, too many machines which could fail at any time, too big masses to be moved safely. Any architect could name multiple fatal examples off the top of their head. Small mistakes growing into accidents, millions lost in equipment, materials, lives.

Galen Erso wasn’t an exception.

The weapon they were building with his very reluctant help had all the flaws of a big project and more. Apart from the Sith breathing down their necks a good seventy percent of the workers were slaves or felons, not the most motivated bunch in the galaxy. Accidents and mistakes were bound to happen.

It suited him just fine. A miscalculation here, contradicting orders there set back the whole process with months, and he seemed compliant enough to get away with it. It gave him more than enough free time as well to work on his ultimate goal, the perfect revenge. The monster’s weakness.

He wasn’t under the illusion he would live to see it unfold. In the moment the station was completed he would become useless, probably executed, definitely put in prison.

It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that someone, somewhere would see it burn.

 

**Twin Suns  
day 14 - prompt: hideout**

Their meeting place was a spaceship.

It wasn’t like the ones her dad took her on sometimes, neither like the ones Aunt Ahsoka flied when she visited. It was bigger, with lots of rooms and droids about and nobody saw them running on the corridors, even if they bumped into someone. It was either a little green creature or a man in a hood, and once or twice Leia even saw her dad.

The boy - Luke - only met her there. She curled up in the garden, hiding behind her favourite tree and closed her eyes, then she was on the spaceship. Sometimes Luke wasn’t there and she spent the time discovering new spots to use in their game of hide-and-seek, but it was rare. He said he hid out in his uncle’s repair shop then. There were times when he disappeared mid-play and times when someone found her and “woke” her up and the same happened to her, but they could play mostly uninterrupted.

There were times when an other, very tall man with longer hair than Leia’s joined them, and he was terrible at hide-and-seek, always forgetting to cover fully. (Luke said it wasn’t his fault that he grew so big. Leia said he should know how to hide his own body.) He brought others occasionally, Luke’s favourite was a weird-looking man who told them about flying real ships, like Aunt Ahsoka did (she snuck into the library and discovered he was a Kel-Dor), she preferred the dark-skinned woman who visited the most often and taught her how to know things. She had marks around her eyes and the tall man always teased her for “keeping them” (she didn’t quite understand it), but she was very beautiful.

Luke didn’t know Aunt Ahsoka, so she told him all about her and space and other interesting things. Luke told her about the desert, the two suns, his aunt and uncle who raised him (she badly wanted to see them and show her mom too - she pointed out her dad but her mom wasn’t on the spaceship) and the toys he got from a wizard he wasn’t supposed to know about. (He said the wizard looked a bit like the hooded man on the ship, just older. Leia wasn’t so sure about this detail - that man wasn’t wizard-like at all.)

They weren’t supposed to know about a lot of things. Luke said it was because they were five, but Leia thought it wasn’t fair. She wanted to know more.

She wanted to know everything.

 

**Ageless Dead  
day 15 - prompt: age**

Physical age was a weird thing. His Master always stayed his Master, but Kanan felt a strange sadness the first year he was older than Depa when she died. He mentioned it to Hera, and she dragged him out that night, telling him about all the stars and their endless history. His arm went numb after she fall asleep on it but he felt better the next morning. (At least he couldn’t see himself aging. He supposed even blindness had its advantages.)

Hera grew older than her mother two years later.

Years passed, and suddenly Ezra was older than him when he last could see him. He visited with his friends on the Ghost, the ship neither of them could give up, not when Hera still grew restless and there was so much wandering to do and he seemed to understand.

Ezra was older than his parents.

One day he realized he was older than Master Windu now.

He found comfort in the fact that he would never be older than Master Yoda.

 

**The Right Way  
day 26 - prompt: before**

Barriss thought of her life as a line of different periods. There was before she became a padawan, before the war, before the bombing (and what did she think it would accomplish, really Offee, you were supposed to be the smart one), but every milestone seemed irrelevant to the real Before - the Jedi Purge.

She survived. Somehow. Long enough to see her Master executed, at least.

She was right, even if her methods weren’t, but there was nobody around to appreciate it, not even herself. The Order failed and she failed, too. The Sith has been playing them from the start, and she did her part just as well as everyone else in his game.

_Predictable. Weak._

Alone.

Then suddenly it was Before again.

In the first few days she couldn’t believe it. She stared at the news in the local pub she went to gather information, saw the clones as protectors of the Republic, working alongside the Jedi, not killing them.

At the first sign of a green armor something snapped inside her, and suddenly everything was clear. She was Before, and she had to make sure that After never came. She stayed up late that night, constructing plans, recalling every bit of knowledge she had.

It cost her only a week and some of her After illegal skills to get off-planet, effectively smuggling herself on a ship going to Coruscant. She had a Sith to uncover, a war to stop, and many, many lives to save.

But first of all, she had to slap some sense into her younger self.

 

**Unknown Heroes  
day 27 - prompt: moment**

It was a decision born in the heat of the moment. He was young, but he wasn’t stupid - the Masters were gone, the clones who meant safety just yesterday were killing everyone in their path, and he wasn’t skilled enough to save the others. He contemplated running, just for a minute. It was obvious that if he wanted to live he had to leave, one way or an other. 

He moved to the direction of the landing platform. If he was lucky, if the Force willed it maybe he could slip away there, and the next step… He didn’t have time to think of the next step, it would be enough when he got out alive.

It was then that he saw the ship. He didn’t recognize it, but it was a senatorial type, and if anyone from the Senate was here it could mean his way out. He ran towards it, only to stop in horror as the clones between him and the ship stopped and took aim.

They were aiming at a senator. A civilian.

He could try to leave… or he could do what he was training for.

He leapt forward, getting between the ship and the clones, saber swinging. He could do this. He had to do this.

He barely felt the heat of the blasters as he was gunned down, only some faint sense of satisfaction. He may have been only a padawan, but he did what he could do.

He hoped his Master will be proud of him.

 

**Analysis: Illogical  
day 28 - prompt: death**

EXIT SLEEPER MODE.

LIFEFORM DETECTED.

IDENTIFY LIFEFORM: Designation: CC-5052 ‘Commander Bly’. Security Level: Beta.

STANDBY.

“Hey, Galle, clean up the General’s droid while we’re out! R4, go with him.”

VOICE COMMAND “go with him” PROCESSING. RESPONSE REQUIRED: LEAVE UNIT ‘Delta-7 Aethersprite-class light interceptor RNHT45’, FOLLOW LIFEFORM: Designation: CT-6734 ‘Galle’. Security Level: Lambda.

ENGAGE MOTORS.

“Here you go, stand there, buddy and power down. Wouldn’t want your circuits fried.”

VOICE COMMAND “stand there, buddy and power down” PROCESSING. RESPONSE REQUIRED: ROUTE TO OIL UNIT, ENTER SLEEPER MODE.

EXIT SLEEPER MODE.

“Now, that’s better, right? Go back to your ship, the General will need you after we’re done here.”

VOICE COMMAND: QUESTION “that’s better, right?” PROCESSING. ANALYSIS: RHETORICAL. NO RESPONSE REQUIRED. VOICE COMMAND “go back to your ship” PROCESSING. RESPONSE REQUIRED: AUTONAV ROUTE TO UNIT ‘Delta-7 Aethersprite-class light interceptor RNHT45’.

ENGAGE MOTORS.

LIFEFORM ON ROUTE DETECTED.

IDENTIFY LIFEFORM: Designation: CC-5052 ‘Commander Bly’. Security Level: Beta.

ALERT LIFEFORM OF PRESENCE: Beeeep.

“Good soldiers follow orders.”

VOICE COMMAND “good soldiers follow orders” PROCESSING. ANALYSIS: PHILOSOPHICAL. IN CONTEXT: ILLOGICAL. CLARIFICATION REQUIRED. RESPONSE REQUIRED: BeepBeep?

LIFEFORM OUT OF RANGE. RESUME AUTONAV ROUTE.

ARRIVE DESTINATION. 

ENTER SLEEPER MODE.

EXIT SLEEPER MODE. WARNING: BATTERY LEVEL 20%. RESPONSE REQUIRED: OUTER LIGHT ACTIVATED. ENTER SLEEPER MODE.

EXIT SLEEPER MODE. WARNING: BATTERY LEVEL 10%. RESPONSE REQUIRED: VOICE SIGNAL. ENTER SLEEPER MODE.

EXIT SLEEPER MODE. WARNING: BATTERY LEVEL 5%. RESPONSE REQUIRED: VOICE SIGNAL. UNIT UNABLE TO ENTER SLEEPER MODE.

WARNING: BATTERY LEVEL 1%.

 

**Fourth Wall  
day 31 - prompt: end**

“Seriously,” sighed Mace, gesturing at the remains of the Fourth Wall. “Whose bright idea was to give Quinlan a snowboard?”

“It was an outside source,” noted Hera, and cuddled up to Kanan a bit more. “It’s the end of the month, so the Author wanted to thank everyone who followed her daily snippets. She thinks herself very clever so she borrowed him to do...” she nodded to the debris “...that.”

“It was nice to have some attention,” smiled Jocasta Nu from the other side of the room where she sat beside Depa and a bit confused Caleb.

“I could do with a little less attention sometimes.” Tahl’s complaining sounded half-serious. “I can’t even count how many times I’ve been blinded.”

“Stop bringing it up, at least you’re alive,” said the older Barriss in winter gear, gaining the approval of the Aayla with the R4 unit and the slightly glowing Force Ghost Mace.

“You think you have it bad?” sulked a figure in Inquisitor clothing. “I don’t even have a name, I just die! Same for you,” it turned to its Jedi companion. “We don’t even have a gender!”

“Hmmm. It happens,” hummed a strangely human-looking Yoda. “Know what I’m doing at the ski lodge, they don’t. Just there, I am.”

“I think it was passable,” said one of the Luminaras while trying to separate a seemingly lost kitten from her robes. “I wasn’t thrilled to have all that trauma, but at least I got to live. Whose cat is this?”

“Mine!” shouted Padawan Depa, and hurried to get it. “Bad Mr. Quiffy, don’t wander off!”

Qui-Gon groaned and poked the chuckling Tahl’s side.

“I haven’t forgot that.”

“Have you seen my glass?”

Everyone looked up at the new voice. Ghost Ranna floated in the door, staring at them expectantly.

“Why are you looking for it here? This is not even your fandom!”

“I took over a whole plot, I don’t see why this would be a problem,” she shrugged. “Also, someone should fix that wall or I won’t get published. See you!”

She left a mix of annoyed and confused faces behind her.


End file.
